Shade is free software under the X11 license, you are welcome to copy it and/or modify it. See COPYING file for the full license text.

Shade uses Python’s distutils so you can install it as any other Python package.

There is a Gentoo ebuild available, to create a Gentoo package:

make clean
make dist
sudo cp dist/shade-*.tar.gz /usr/portage/distfiles
ebuild dist/app-misc/shade/shade-*.ebuild digest

Now you can copy the dist/app-misc tree to an overlay or install Shade directly with:

sudo ebuild dist/app-misc/shade/shade-*.ebuild merge

Shade uses sudo for all commands that need elevated privileges so your user has to be able to use it.

Display built-in help:

open --help

Open a file:

open my_file.txt

Open a file in background:

open --backgound my_file.txt

Open first file in current directory, useful for directories with photos or similar files:

open --first

List remembered mime type, handling application pairs:

open --list

Record a handler for a mime type:

open --mime text/plain --app vim
open my_file.txt --app vim
open --first --app vim

Forget an application associated with a mime type:

open --mime text/plain --forget
open my_file.txt --forget

Switch between muted/unmuted settings on all sinks:

pa-control --mute
pa-control --unmute
pa-control --mute-switch

Set volume (value from 0 to 100):

pa-control --volume 50

Increase/decrease volume by 5:

pa-control --volume-up
pa-control --volume-down

Put computer to sleep:

shade --sleep suspend
shade --sleep hibernate

Lock the screen (using xscreensaver):

shade --sleep lock

Switch between “power save” and “performance” power management modes:

shade --power-management powersave
shade --power-management performance

If ~/.shade/on-resume.sh is executable it will be executed after computer has resumed from suspend or hibernate.

Switch between display modes:

shade --display new_mode

Display modes are specified in ~/.shade/display.conf. Display names are the ones you get from the xrandr utility. Example configuration:

[internal]
LVDS1=main

[external]
VGA1=main

[both]
VGA1=main
LVDS1=right-of VGA1

[presentation]
VGA1=main
LVDS1=same-as VGA1

[Properties]
LVDS1=scaling mode:Full aspect

[OnSwitch]
command=~/scripts/restart_xscreensaver_and_other_stuff.sh

Properties section is optional. Properties are set using xrandr --output OUTPUT --set PROPERTY VALUE, you can get a list of valid properties with xrandr --prop. The OnSwitch section is also optional and specifies a command that should be run after the display mode is switched, you can use it to restart some applications like xscreensaver or Conky. All non‐special sections have to be lower case.

Running storage will give you a prompt where you can use following commands:

• list — print all plugged USB drives and their partitions. This is the default command, if you hit enter on an empty line this command will be called.

• update — refresh the list of available devices. Normally this will not be necessary, as Storage dynamically updates the list of devices as they are plugged in/out. In the event that something goes wrong and automatic updates don’t work it is here though.

• exit — exit the command prompt.

• mount [partition] — mount selected partition.

• umount [partition] — unmount selected partition.

• unmount [partition] — unmount selected partition.

• lock [partition] — lock a LUKS partition.

• unlock [partition] — unlock a LUKS partition.

• detach [device] — detach (power off) a device.

The executables in bin won’t be able to access the libraries in lib by default. You should add the lib directory to your PYTHONPATH for them to work. If you’re using shell for development, you can source the provided devenv.sh script to do so.